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Mother grieves after bodies of daughter and her boyfriend were found in Madison County

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MADISON COUNTY, Ind. -- A grieving mother wants to know what happened to her daughter after she was found dead in a Madison County field Thursday night alongside her boyfriend's body.

"I hate to think of her being out there cold for even one minute. I was scared about that from the beginning. I just didn't want her to be cold," said Rene Ruiz, Heavan Henderson's mother.

The bodies of 21-year-old Heavan Henderson and 23-year-old Jeremy Dankowski were found by a snowmobiler.  He called 911 to say he thought he saw a body near a railroad crossing in the area of CR 200 S and 700 W.  Deputies arrived on the scene and located two bodies.

The pair, who were both from Lapel, had been living in Indianapolis and were last seen in the city on Dec. 17.  Their car was found in abandoned in Woodward Park in Lapel.

MORE | 2 bodies found in Madison Co. identified as missing couple

Heavan's mother says she recently had a dream about her daughter.

"She was beautiful. She was her happy self. She was shining. She was smiling at me. Reporter: 'I take that to mean she is in heaven?' She is a good girl. Reporter: 'Heavan is in Heaven?' Yeah."

Police theorize Henderson and Dankowski could have walked the one-and-a-half miles to where the bodies were discovered.

A handgun, shell casings, a purse and a cell phone were recovered at the scene.

"The phone was actually in the gun case. There was a gun case purchased when the gun was purchased. It was inside the gun case, snow-covered. The phone was powered off, but we did find that it was operational. In the coming days, detectives will take a look at that cell phone to see if there is any information to generate leads as to why this happened," said Lt. Darwin Dwiggins, Madison Co. Sheriff's Department.

Sheriff Scott Mellinger says it's a reasonable assumption that the deaths were a murder-suicide but that has not been confirmed. An autopsy on both bodies will be performed over the weekend.

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